Iran immediately responded to US-Israeli strikes on February 28 by launching coordinated missile and drone attacks against US military installations in the Gulf region. Since then, its targeting has expanded to airports, seaports, hotels and oil refineries. The debris from missile interceptions has produced several casualties.
The first official statements from governments in the Gulf, with the exception of Oman, refrained from condemning the US-Israeli strikes. Those strikes killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with several senior Iranian officials and nearly 180 civilians. Many of these were schoolgirls killed in an attack on a school in southern Iran.
This lack of condemnation did not go unnoticed. Across social media, a wave of debate broke out, with many Gulf citizens asking how governments that style themselves as voices of measured multilateralism could fail to register the illegality of the US-Israeli aggression against Iran.
